Skip the ground and try planting fruits and vegetables in straw bales instead, suggests Joel
Karsten, author of
Straw Bale Gardens (Cool Springs, $19.99) and guru of one of this year’s gardening
trends.

The idea behind straw bale gardening is simple.

“It’s basically a different type of container garden,” said Karsten, 43, of Roseville, Minn.

Only the vessel is a bale of straw, and the medium, a nutrient-rich compost created by the straw
and a bit of fertilizer, is weed-free.

Perhaps that is what has drawn tens of thousands of people to Karsten’s Facebook page on straw
bale gardening.

Marketing executive Patricia Baker tried the technique as a way to avoid the weeds that abound
in the heavy clay soil at her home in the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts.

“I found that some plants did better than others — basically the ones that like the heat, like
peppers,” said Baker, 51, who also had success growing tomatoes.

The idea sprang from Karsten’s days on the family farm. As a child, he was intrigued by the
thistles and other plants he would see sprouting from wet bales of straw, and he wondered how they
grew. After graduating from the University of Minnesota’s horticulture program, he began
experimenting with straw bales as a growing medium at his suburban St. Paul home, which sat at the
edge of a swamp on top of construction fill.

“I couldn’t grow vegetables in what I had, so I thought, ‘What if I use straw bales like I saw
up against the side of the barn?’ ” he said.

After trial and error, he figured out how to condition the bale for planting.

What you need

First, be sure to buy straw bales, not hay. Hay bales contain seeds, which will grow into weeds,
and isn’t that one big reason you’re trying straw-bale gardening?

Hay bales typically are green while straw bales are a golden yellow. You can find them at
nurseries and garden stores, and Karsten also started a website (www.strawbale market.com) to help
people find bales for sale.

About 15 bales will provide the same plant production as a 20-by-20-foot traditional garden.

Karsten suggests using about five bales per person you want to feed.

You’ll also need a soaker hose and 21/2 cups per bale of lawn fertilizer that is at least 20
percent nitrogen, with no added herbicides. If you’re going the organic route, Karsten suggests
using 3 pounds of blood meal per bale.

How to condition bales

Before planting, you need to condition the straw bales for 10 to 12 days.

First, lay them out as you want them in the garden, placing them end to end in a row and turning
them up on their sides.

Every other day, sprinkle fertilizer over the bale and wash it into the bale with a hose,
watering long enough that water comes out from under the bale, Karsten said. On days you don’t
fertilize, water the bale.

On the 12th day, you should be ready to plant on the tops and even the sides of the bales,
spacing the plants as you normally would.

If planting seeds, lay down 1 to 2 inches of potting soil on top of the bales first.

How to maintain them

Not much maintenance is required, but Karsten recommends watering the bales every day when it’s
hot with a soaker hose or a drip irrigation system with one hose placed down into the middle of the
bale. Watering every two to three days is fine in the spring and fall.

Trellises are needed for taller or climbing plants such as tomatoes and beans, and Karsten
recommends covering the bales with a tarp if temperatures dip to 30 degrees or lower at night.

You can often use a bale two years in a row, but compost it after that.